Total Nerd Pokemon Vs. Digimon - Who Is Best?

Two bitter rivals face off in today's Total Nerd Versus

In one corner, the popular video game franchise turned card game that eventually exploded into a massive multimedia empire

In the other corner, the popular video game franchise turned card game

that eventually exploded into a massive multimedia empire. No wonder we're debating this

This is Versus, a head-to-head competition in order to answer the age-old question

who's the best? Let's battle! Category 1, Video Games. Fans of the Pokemon series more than likely have their fondest memories in the first generation

Pokemon Red, Green, Blue, and Yellow were all smash hits and are fondly remembered to this day

N64 titles, Pokemon Stadium, and Pokemon Snap also have great replay and nostalgia factors

While the handheld games have remained solid, if not repetitive and formulaic

Nintendo has also released some real Poke stinkers. My Pokemon Ranch, Pokemon Battle Revolution, Pokemon Dash, and the disaster of Hey You Pikachu

All have to be in consideration here. And while Pokemon Go was fun for an entire day

recent entries culminated with the much-hated Pokemon Home, a cloud subscription service that can hold some of your Pokemon from three so-so games

or all if you're willing to pay a monthly fee. Digimon, on the other hand, haven't experienced the whirlwind of ups and downs

Hardcore fans of the series might not have been treated to all-time classics like Pokefans

as the Digimon World Series released several decent games across various platforms in the 2000s

While they weren't the all-time classics that the Pokemon franchise had, they still led to several spinoff fighting and card games

Also Digimon have definitely watched their games transition smoothly into the 21st century PS4 titles like Cyber Sleuth and its sequel Hacker Memory provided more detailed stories updated graphics and more to do on a console system While the fighting or racing spinoffs

are nothing to write home about, they certainly don't feature the series mascot badly reacting to instructions on a microphone

Six out of 10, Pokemon. Six out of 10, Digimon. Winner, tie

Category 2, TV series. Both of these franchises started releasing episodes of their very own anime shortly after their games

Artistically, the Pokemon TV show peaked quite early. Who could forget unbelievable moments like Ash letting Butterfree go and Team Rocket blasting off again

Though, if you haven't checked in on the series in a while, Ash Ketchum just became a Pokemon master in 2019

That's right, Ash's journey to become the very best took 52 badges, 7 frontier symbols, and over 20 years

All future seasons rinsed and repeated the same formula and simply added more badges or challenges for Ash to complete before achieving his goal

Digimon is still going strong with a more impactful story, not feeling the obligation to release new series every year

and maintaining the story's flexibility of exploring new and different stories has made this a far more palatable watch in recent years

While Pokemon has explored some larger themes in recent years, Digimon has dedicated full seasons of their show to artificial intelligence

parallel universes, and merging with ancient spirits so that our leads could become Digimon themselves

If you can't get enough Pokemon, sure, watch the anime, But for a much more rich and interesting experience, try Digimon

5 out of 10, Pokemon. 7 out of 10, Digimon. Winner, Digimon

Category 3, theme song. The Pokemon theme song is a jam While the Digimon theme certainly resonates among its more hardcore fans this one really isn all that close Let take a look at the lyrics starting with Digimon Simplistic lyrics certainly work but they pale in comparison to the absolute poetry of the Pokemon theme

You're my best friend in a world we must defend. You and me, I know it's my destiny

Arm in arm will win the fight, it's always been our dream. Come on, this is basically Shakespeare

And obviously we can't play the melodies here for copyright reasons. But all I need to do is allude to the opening guitar hit of the Pokemon theme

And bam, it's stuck in your head. And while some of the later seasons of the show mixed up the themes for both shows

you can't deny that the Pokemon theme is one of the better theme songs to any show ever

And this is without even touching on the majesty of the Poke-Rap. 10 out of 10, Pokemon

1 out of 10, Digimon. Winner, Pokemon. Category 4, Movies. Digimon and Pokemon have both released several movies to go along with their other properties

Mostly these are animated feature length versions of what you'd expect from the shows

Young fans from the 90s probably have nostalgia for Digimon the movie and Pokemon the first movie

But both have very low Rotten Tomatoes scores and don't age as well as you'd expect

Pokemon was able to get a few more movies into theaters and had a few more memorable moments like Ash Turning to Stone and the adorable opening to Pikachu's Vacation

With this in mind, let's talk about Detective Pikachu. The film was one of the biggest blockbuster hits of the last few years

and was generally well-liked among fans and critics. The film leaned heavily on featuring Ryan Reynolds as Detective Pikachu

As the first live-action feature to include Pokemon, it was a refreshing take on the franchise that had been slightly stale in terms of its feature films

most of which had been direct-to-video for years. So with slightly more theatrical releases and the ringer of Detective Pikachu we giving this round to the monsters in your pocket 8 out of 10 Pokemon 4 out of 10 Digimon

Winner, Pokemon. Category 5, Card Game. Both games are played similarly and feature the same characters as the shows, movies, etc

Gotta give this to Pokemon for having a larger fan base and tournaments still widely watched by fans

Although widely may be a stretch for the Digimon card game. The Pokemon card game has earned over 12 billion dollars

Their tournaments still generate tons of fans, and collector's items in the series are worth in the hundreds of thousands of dollars

Digimon had, or I guess still has, a card game, but has done very little to separate itself from the shadow left by the Pokemon trading card game

The actual games are played similarly, and it's hard to give Digimon any additional points for innovation or creativity in this category

9 out of 10, Pokemon. 6 out of 10, Digimon. Winner, Pokemon

Category 6, Lasting Impact. Let's face it, artistic integrity, a legion of fans, and some solid if not slightly underwhelming games and moments aren't enough to put Digimon over the edge in this fight

Hardcore fans aside, the series hasn't made a significant impact since posing a small threat to the Pokemon Empire in the early years

Pokemon is the highest grossing media franchise in history. Seriously, Pokemon has made more than Mario, Marvel, Harry Potter, Transformers, Barbie, and even Mickey Mouse himself

You can criticize their properties all you want, but Pokemon is here to stay

They truly were the very best, like no one ever was. Bum, bum, bum

8 out of 10, Pokemon. 5 out of 10, Digimon. Winner, Pokemon

Well, our competitors have made their moves, and the battle is over

And the winner is... Pokemon